Shakespeare's Queen Mary?

IOTL, the latest, in terms of setting, of Shakespeare's "history plays" is the seldom-performed Henry VIII. Could he have written a play about the reign of Queen Mary? Possibly he'd have to live a bit longer to avoid any problems with the "Spanish Match", but it would be interesting if he had managed to write such a politically-charged play- and the only history play with a female main character.
Could he have written history plays about any other English monarchs? What would they have been like?
 
IOTL, the latest, in terms of setting, of Shakespeare's "history plays" is the seldom-performed Henry VIII. Could he have written a play about the reign of Queen Mary? Possibly he'd have to live a bit longer to avoid any problems with the "Spanish Match", but it would be interesting if he had managed to write such a politically-charged play- and the only history play with a female main character.
Could he have written history plays about any other English monarchs? What would they have been like?

All his history plays generally fit into a grand progression leading up to Henry VIII and thus, by implication Elizabeth (and James). In order to not get into trouble he'd have to paint her as a monster, much as he did with Richard III- and in the case of Mary, I think the events would still have been too recent. It would have meant portraying people who might have still been alive (or whose children would be) in none-too-flattering ways. Basically it would have made him a lot of enemies.

Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, portraying a Tudor monarch, even an unpopular one, as a monster would be, by implication, criticizing the House of Tudor as a whole (and by extension the House of Stuart). This would not be very wise.
 
The Plantaganet Plays

The English plays with one exception are restricted to the Plantagenet era. These are restricted. Mary 1st would have involved religion and there are theories that Shakespeare was a closet catholic so he would have avoided the subject. Noticably he avoids Henry 11.

He could have tried Edward 1st or 2nd although Marlowe beat him to the latter. Harold and William are possibilities. William Rufus would be more in Marlowe's field. Elizabeth 1st would be too controversial likewise Mary Queen of Scots and maybe a few kings were just to boring for plays
 
IOTL, the latest, in terms of setting, of Shakespeare's "history plays" is the seldom-performed Henry VIII. Could he have written a play about the reign of Queen Mary? Possibly he'd have to live a bit longer to avoid any problems with the "Spanish Match", but it would be interesting if he had managed to write such a politically-charged play- and the only history play with a female main character.
Could he have written history plays about any other English monarchs? What would they have been like?

I think a play about Mary Tudor would have been impossible, for the reasons stated. Consider how much trouble Shakespeare faced from the descendents of Sir John Oldcastle, the RL figure who inspired Falstaff. IIRC, he was almost sued for slander and faced considerable political pressure to change the character's name, which obviously he did. And Oldcastle was a relatively obscure historical figure who died (again, IIRC) in 1418. Now imagine how many more political hurdles would grow up around a monarch lots of audience members had lived under, and whose legitimacy as monarch (regardless of the religious question) could not really be disputed in a way that didn't undermine Elizabeth and James.

It's also important to remember that all of Shakespeare's plays had to pass a censor before they could be performed. That said, I think he got some pretty daring stuff through: Falstaff in 2 Henry IV, for example, is a total scumbag, and his scumbaggery poses a fairly obvious challenge to the corruption in the Elizabethan military. To show how edgy that was, consider that when Edmund Spenser wrote a non-fictionalized critique of the same corruption in "A View of the State of Ireland," that critique prevented Spenser's text from being published until 40 years after the author's death.
 
It's also important to remember that all of Shakespeare's plays had to pass a censor before they could be performed.
Interesting point. In that case then a play about Matilda in which he did a Richard III on Stephen is still waiting to be discovered.
 
Could he have written history plays about any other English monarchs? What would they have been like?

Maybe Edward I, with a strong focus on the Hammer of the Scots image if English-Scotish relations go really bad. Then, a tragic Edward II, which could tie in nicely with his possible collaboration Edward III, especially if he creates a character or two with the popularity Falstaff enjoyed.

Or, maybe an Arthurian play.
 
Maybe Edward I, with a strong focus on the Hammer of the Scots image if English-Scotish relations go really bad.

When the heir to the throne is the King of Scotland, one feels that such subject matter would be best avoided by the judicious playwright :D

It's easy to forget that Shakespeare was effectively a writer in a police state. He'd stay well away from stuff that wasn't kosher.
 
When the heir to the throne is the King of Scotland, one feels that such subject matter would be best avoided by the judicious playwright :D

It's easy to forget that Shakespeare was effectively a writer in a police state. He'd stay well away from stuff that wasn't kosher.

Indeed. My vague half-thought was that history might have diverged when Shakespeare was rather younger, with Catherine Grey and Elizabeth somehow reconciling, the former's children recognised as legitimate, parliament eventually making a definite choice of the Greys over the Stuarts for succession, and a near-total breakdown in relations between the two nations. Or some other series of events contrived to give Shakespeare the right environment to produce such a work - obviously not the England of OTL.

Another possibility for a history play might be Richard the Lionhearted - maybe focused on the Crusades with Saladin as the Noble Adversary and Phillip as the Scheming Rival.
 
Another possibility for a history play might be Richard the Lionhearted - maybe focused on the Crusades with Saladin as the Noble Adversary and Phillip as the Scheming Rival.
I can't see Saladin being portrayed as the Noble Adversary. Shakespeare was a bit of a racist. In Titus Andronicus the Moor Aaron gets the blames for what the Goths did to the Romans. If the Bard did the Crusades we are likely to find that the the Good Christian was subverted by the Wicked Infidel into doing bad deeds.
 
I can't see Saladin being portrayed as the Noble Adversary. Shakespeare was a bit of a racist. In Titus Andronicus the Moor Aaron gets the blames for what the Goths did to the Romans. If the Bard did the Crusades we are likely to find that the the Good Christian was subverted by the Wicked Infidel into doing bad deeds.

Or Othello, would be an example of the good Moor.
 
Couldn't some kind of Queen Mary play be done, perhaps playing on the struggle of the Protestant faith against the attempts of the Catholic Restoration? I could see something like that being written after Elizabeth's death. Certainly not while she's alive, as she wasn't that ill disposed towards her sister, she was buried next to her.

I don't see why it's out of the question, especially if written towards the end of his life, in the 1610s. By then, Queen Mary's reign was almost fifty years in the past I doubt very few would be alive to recall it.
 
I don't see why it's out of the question, especially if written towards the end of his life, in the 1610s. By then, Queen Mary's reign was almost fifty years in the past I doubt very few would be alive to recall it.


DrakeRlugia,

As already pointed out in the thread, in the OTL Shakespeare had considerable trouble with the descendants of Sir John Oldcastle who had died nearly 200 years before The Bard write him into his plays. Fifty years is going to be nothing, especially given the much greater importance of Mary. A book detailing the deaths of many of those caught up in the Marian Persecutions, Foxe's Book of Martyrs was already a best seller in England before Shakespeare began writing, during his lifetime, and for several decades afterward.

The topic of Mary is simply far too political for Shakespeare to tackle and, as already pointed out in this thread, he was writing in what was essentially a heavy handed police state.

Now, if Mary's reign were somehow different, a Shakespearean play about Mary would become much more plausible.


Bill
 
Top